Lynmouth in Devon

Visit Lynmouth and the surrounding villages and stay in bed & breakfast accommodation:

Lynmouth, Devon. Lynmouth, through which the river pours (and caused the 1952 “Lynmouth disaster” when, in one night of deluge, it brought its boulders with it), was a disconsolate fishing village when the Napoleonic Wars brought it popularity as a resort. Till c. 1607 it had a prosperous herring industry. Then, quite suddenly it seems, the herring shoals went elsewhere. In 1812 Shelley came to stay here, far from family disapproval, with his 16-year-old bride, and extolled the place. So did Southey.

Beside Lynmouth harbour is a classic row of thatched cottages. The view of Lynmouth's bay from the road up to Countisbury to the East is supreme. From the top of the hill, the land collapses to the right into a perfect Exmoor valley. Hereabouts a Danish incursion is said (though Northam, near Bideford, claims the same battle) to have been repulsed in 878. There are vestiges of an ancient fort.